


speeding like a dead comet

by queenbaskerville



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s03e14-15 The Boiling Rock, Gen, Hair Braiding, I didn't think about how they have so much time to chat during a prison break so don't ask me, Prison, Responsible Father Figure, Salvage, Sibling Bonding, Spoilers, Timeline What Timeline, Towards the Sun, author seriously has no concept of time, azula has a pet, hakoda and suki begin their life-changing field trip with zuko, hakoda reunites with one wayward child and reluctantly acquires five new children, may and ty lee and azula will have their life changing field trip later, no albatross pigeons or isopups were harmed in the making of this fic, prison abolitionist zuko, this is a crossover of two fics by muffinlance, zuko misses seal jerky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2021-02-19 12:06:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22710571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenbaskerville/pseuds/queenbaskerville
Summary: Zuko and Azula show up at Boiling Rock to free Mai and Ty Lee. Suki and Hakoda are a bit of a surprise.Especially Hakoda. They haven’t seen each other since, well—since the first time it was Zuko who was the prisoner.
Relationships: Azula & Hakoda (Avatar), Azula & Mai & Ty Lee, Azula & Mai & Ty Lee & Zuko, Azula & Zuko (Avatar), Hakoda & Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 196
Kudos: 3522
Collections: Azula Likes Birds Cinematic Universe, Canon Divergent AUs





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MuffinLance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MuffinLance/gifts), [neuronary](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neuronary/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Towards the Sun](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19252807) by [MuffinLance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MuffinLance/pseuds/MuffinLance). 
  * Inspired by [Salvage](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21116591) by [MuffinLance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MuffinLance/pseuds/MuffinLance). 
  * Inspired by [Ozai's Goat Beard v. Big Hawk](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21858940) by [neuronary](https://archiveofourown.org/users/neuronary/pseuds/neuronary). 
  * Inspired by [What do you mean, it doesn't crash-land?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22670155) by [ObsidiatheDragon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObsidiatheDragon/pseuds/ObsidiatheDragon). 



> this is basically fanfic of fanfic, or like vignettes from my idea of fanfic of fanfic (thank you for your hard work, muffinlance). at the time im publishing this here, [salvage](https://archiveofourown.org/works/21116591/chapters/50249441) has seven chapters and [towards the sun](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19252807) has twenty. so spoilers for those fics!!  
>  **EDIT 3/1/20! Salvage has posted chapter 8 (an excellent chapter that almost made me cry!). This fic is not canon compliant with anything after chapter 7.**  
>  **EDIT 5/7/20! Towards the Sun has posted chapter 21 (also excellent). This fic is not canon compliant with anything after chapter 20.**
> 
> I’m essentially imagining a scenario in which zuko’s time in water tribe hands ultimately changes little of the a:tla plot and he still sides with azula in ba sing se. and from there, the events of turn your face toward the sun happen pretty much exactly as they go (the only difference being that zuko remembers sokka’s name, lol.) 
> 
> fic title from [“stench of the unburied” by the mountain goats. ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iGV6zpHsGU)
> 
> alright who’s ready for a prison break

Hakoda hasn’t seen the Fire Prince in a long time, with the exception of the portrait that had gone up on the prison wall for a few months.

The boy had looked regal and solemn, hair fully grown and pulled back, only one strand out of place. He’d looked a bit tired, nothing like the too-energetic enraged teenager whom Hakoda had captured so long ago now. Hakoda has wondered what kind of Fire Lord the prince became, what he was doing to the rest of the world. If the slowly extinguished hopes of Suki’s Fire Nation friends were any indication, Zuko turned out too busy or too uncaring to pay attention to prisoners. 

The portrait was replaced with the Dragon of the West one day. Suki had turned to the Fire Nation girls, Mai and Ty Lee, who said nothing. Mai looked grim. Ty Lee looked down at her hands. 

Not long after, the Fire Prince himself showed up. 

So, Hakoda hasn’t seen him in a long time. Until now. 

* * *

Zuko hadn’t been able to help himself; more than once, the first few weeks of his dark summer, he’d compared his imprisonment in the windowless stone room to his time on the Water Tribe ship. It taunted him, that memory of still being allowed to see sunlight. He forced himself not to think about it after that. 

During his time as Fire Lord, he’d been too busy to think about the Southern Water Tribe, hadn’t thought about what it meant that it was Sokka and Katara who came to treat with him rather than Hakoda. Not until Sokka asked for that list of prisoners. 

Zuko had stared at the list in shock. He hadn’t even considered the fighting—who’d been fighting, and when—even reading his reports from his generals—

Zuko privately added more specific names to the list before sending out the request for locations. He penned them carefully, unsure of the spelling, but clarifying that that was the case in case the prisons had more accurate records and got confused. Toklo, Panuk, Kustaa. Bato. Ranalok, Tuluk. Even Aake.

He wrote all the names he could remember and requested expedited replies. 

His throne was taken from him before he heard back. That information belonged to Fire Lord Iroh. 

* * *

“What’re you doing here?” Hakoda asks when he sees him.

“Breaking you out, I guess,” Zuko says. He’d seemed equally startled when he lay eyes on Hakoda, but he has settled into some sort of calm now. “Though I came for Mai and Ty Lee.”

“Suki’s friends,” Hakoda says, without thinking. He’d mentally compared them both to Zuko in the past months, the only other “friendly” Fire Nation people he’d known—if, by friendly, Hakoda meant not actively trying to kill him. They’re not like Zuko, though, not really. Mai has a similar sulky air to her, but other than that—very different. 

“They’re mine.”

Hakoda doesn’t flinch from the sudden sound because he’s a grown man, battle-seasoned; not much scares him anymore. But it’s a close thing. Zuko doesn’t react at all—of course he wouldn’t; Hakoda can tell with one look when the girl turns the corner, stepping out of the shadows, that these two are kin. Golden eyes gleam at him, dark eyebrows narrow, a pale hand twirls a smooth strand of hair. 

“They’re your friends?” Hakoda asks the Fire Princess. 

She sneers at him. 

“They belong to me,” she says. 

Hakoda decides not to unpack that. 

* * *

“You seem different,” Hakoda says.

Zuko blinks at him and reaches back to touch his low ponytail. 

“Yeah,” Zuko says. “Guess so.”

Hakoda had been talking about more than just his hair. 

* * *

The Fire Princess—Azula—spreads the blueprint out in her hands, holding it low enough that all three of them can tilt their heads down and see. It’s crowded, the three of them in the janitors closet they’ve sequestered themselves in. They stand close enough they almost have to touch. Zuko looks a bit twitchy at the enclosedness of it. 

“Mai, Ty Lee, and Suki all bunk there,” Hakoda says, pointing. “I bunk over here.”

“Who’s Suki again?” Zuko asks. 

“A Kyoshi warrior,” he says. “We won’t be leaving without her.”

“Hmm,” Azula says. 

“Fine,” Zuko says. Then, “Is anyone else here? Toklo or Panuk or the others?”

Hakoda isn’t surprised, exactly, that Zuko remembers their names after all this time. He just didn’t realize Zuko would think to ask.

“No,” Hakoda says, “just me.”

Something passes over Zuko’s face too quick for Hakoda to read it. Zuko returns to his (unfamiliar) baseline—grim, calm.

“Azula?" he says.

"This is what we're going to do," she says.

The Fire Princess outlines a plan. Some of what she says makes absolutely no sense to Hakoda, but Zuko nods along like he gets it.

Zuko would be winging this if she wasn't here, Hakoda realizes. It shouldn't be a comfort. But it's evidence that the Fire Prince hasn't changed _too_ much.

* * *

The shock on Ty Lee’s and Mai’s faces—especially Mai—when they see Zuko and Azula together, here in the prison, coming for them, is painful to look at. Hakoda feels invasive just standing there. He politely averts his eyes, until a squeal from Ty Lee prompts him to look back, and she has thrown her arms around Azula. Azula tolerates this. 

“This doesn’t mean that I forgive you,” Ty Lee says, when she pulls away from Azula. 

Azula rears back, affronted. 

“ _You_ forgive _me?_ ”

“Not yet,” Ty Lee says. 

“Let’s do this later,” Zuko says, looking harried. 

Hakoda can’t blame him. Azula seems ready to fry someone, Ty Lee refuses to display any emotion beyond “cheerful mask,” and the tension between Zuko and Mai is palpable. 

Mai folds her arms and turns away.

* * *

“You burned down my village!” Suki says. 

Zuko winces. 

“Yeah,” he says. “I’m really sorry about that.”

“This is boring,” Azula says. 

Suki forgets to reply to Zuko in her shock at seeing the princess. 

“You,” Suki sputters, “you—“

“Oh, man,” Zuko says. 

* * *

“Is there anyone else here? The rest of your warriors?”

“No,” Suki says. “Just me.”

“Good,” Azula says. “The airship would’ve been crowded with so many peasants.”

Suki scowls at her. 

“ _Azula_ ,” Zuko says. Then, to Suki, more somberly, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“They’re not dead,” Suki says. “At least, I hope not. When we were separated they were planning on taking them to another prison.”

“Oh,” Zuko says. 

He looks at Hakoda, for some reason, and—and it’s hope, blossoming on his face.

“My men, too,” Hakoda says quickly.

Zuko’s shoulders sag with relief. Something twists in Hakoda’s heart at the prince’s worry. Hakoda resolves to ignore it. 

Hakoda remembers the number of his warriors who did fall in battle. He doesn’t say who, now, or that it happened at all—they need to focus, need to get out of here. Hakoda’s good at prioritizing, packing his feelings away. He’s not sure, even with this new control over his temper, that the prince can do the same.

* * *

Not as many guards try to stop them at the beginning of their escape as Hakoda expects. They’re all at the ready—all but Azula, who inspects her fingernails as she walks—and yet all it takes is Zuko’s quick movements to render the few guards unconscious. He doesn’t bend fire once. It’s the dao, the ones Hakoda had noticed strapped to his back but hadn’t figured out how to ask about, that Zuko uses, wielding them like he was born with them in his hands.

They make a detour to retrieve seized weapons—Suki’s fans, Mai’s throwing knives, Hakoda’s bone club and foreign shortswords. Ty Lee didn’t have anything, apparently. 

“Don’t need anything,” she says cheerily. “I’m me!”

"Alright," Hakoda says, since no one else seems to think it’s unusual to send a nonbending teenage girl into a fight weaponless.

It’s when they rush out, head for the air balloon, that the warden sets a number of guards charging upon them. The fight that follows goes quick but clean—Fire Nation soldiers against Hakoda and six teenagers more dangerous than they should have any right to be.

“Try not to kill anyone,” Zuko had said before they began. “They’re just doing their jobs.”

Hakoda has little respect for Fire Nation soldiers and their "jobs." He hadn’t said anything, though, knowing he’d do what he had to do. 

They escape without any fatalities. The one time Hakoda goes for a killing blow against a soldier, the girl Ty Lee appears out of thin air, jabbing the soldier in a way that makes him drop like a stone—immobilized, but not dead. Hakoda leaves him be, moves on to the next soldier, and accepts Ty Lee’s intervention for what it was—a reminder, maybe even a warning. Fine. He won’t distract her again. 

Azula’s blue fire almost makes Hakoda freeze in shock. He’s never seen that before. She flies around as fast as a lightning strike, blue fire blasting from her hands. She’s terrifying. Hakoda will later think on what it means that the Fire Lord turned his fourteen-year-old daughter into one of the most effective weapons Hakoda has ever seen. Right now, though, he turns his attention back to his enemy.

He catches glimpses of Zuko out of the corner of his eye in the fight, and Zuko, too, is as quick as lightning. It's more of what Hakoda doesn't see, though, that startles him—Zuko uses his dao, but he doesn't firebend once. 

* * *

When Zuko rushes to aid Azula in liftoff, he adds fuel from some storage compartment to a low-burning fire, but he still doesn't _bend_ any fire. Azula sends up a few initial few blasts of blue flame before subsiding to red, and when the fuel-fire burns out she continues to power the airship on her own.

Hakoda recalls Zuko's insistence, back on the ship, that bending was as necessary as breathing, that it wasn't healthy to suppress his flames, that firebenders _have_ to bend. Why, then, hasn't Zuko bent fire once in all this time? Hakoda knows Zuko hadn't been lying, back then. Not only is the prince the worst liar Hakoda has ever met, but also Hakoda could tell firebending just came naturally to him. The boy spat sparks, for moon's sake. 

(Hakoda hasn't seen him breathe fire at all, either.) 

Is it just that he's better at controlling himself now? Or has something else changed, some firebender thing Hakoda wouldn't be able to even begin at guessing at?

He means to ask, but he gets distracted when Zuko comes up to him, saying, "Hey, you remember that albatross-pigeon that didn't come back?"

Hakoda blinks at him for a moment before recalling the albatross-pigeon that had gone off with a ransom note for Fire Lord Ozai, and that it had never returned; a Fire Nation hawk had been the one to bring the Fire Lord's answer.

"What about it," Hakoda asks.

"Well," Zuko says, right as a spirits-damned albatross pigeon whomps around and flies right past Hakoda.

"Tui and La!"

"Yeah," Zuko says.

The bird flaps its wings and perches near Azula, who's still managing the flames keeping them aloft. The albatross-pigeon nuzzles its dumb head into the princess's shoulder. She pretends to ignore it; the tight, concentrated gaze on her face softens so slightly that Hakoda almost doesn't see it.

Hakoda finds himself thinking again that the brother and sister in front of him are eerily similar.

"Reminds me of when the birds would get all in your hair," Hakoda says.

"She killed most of the animals I liked as a kid," Zuko says, "so I guess we're lucky she liked this one."

Hakoda stares at him.

"Well, I guess not _most_ ," Zuko amends, frowning. "It was really just the one or two times. She mostly left the turtleducks alone."

"I can _hear_ you," Azula says.

* * *

The airship isn't very big. Hakoda wakes to the sound of Zuko's quiet murmuring—why is that boy awake; didn't he say they would sleep in shifts; isn't this the time he and Hakoda are both meant to be sleeping?

"I'm sorry," Zuko says.

"We thought you weren't coming," Mai says.

Her voice is as gravelly as it usually is, but there's a softness there, too, something pained and hurt.

"I'm sorry," he says again. "I didn't know."

"You didn't ask?" Ty Lee says.

"I should have," Zuko says. "I should've thought—I don't know why I didn't—"

They're not within eyesight, so Hakoda doesn't interrupt them as he rises and walks away. He tries to give them a little privacy.

But, again, the airship isn't that big. He ends up approaching Azula and Suki, the latter of whom turns at his approach and gives him a tired wave.

"You girls doing alright?" Hakoda asks.

It's—weird, to think of them standing together without hissing at each other. But hanging out in silence is good enough, he supposes.

Azula doesn't turn from where she's powering the airship with her fire, but her lips curl up in a sneer at his question. 

(Zuko _really_ shouldn't be awake, then, if it's Azula's turn now, if Zuko's meant to be resting before he takes over for his turn. His turn fueling it with the actual fuel. Spirits, why doesn't the boy just use his fire? Hakoda never thought he'd want so badly for a firebender to bend.)

Hakoda means to ask Azula about the albatross-pigeon, but she speaks first, instead.

"So you're the savage who held my brother captive for months," she says.

"We wouldn't have had to hold him for so long," Hakoda says without thinking, "if your father had ransomed him."

Azula does rear on him then, her face thunderous. 

"You will speak of the Fire Lord with the proper respect, you Water Tribe low life," she bites out.

Hakoda bites back his own reply, reminding himself that this is a fourteen-year-old he's about to snap at. A fourteen-year-old who's the only thing right now, besides their limited fuel supply, between them and plummeting to their deaths. A fourteen-year-old who could burn him alive if she wanted.

(How different it had been, to be a prisoner of the Fire Nation, filled with dread as he wondered every day if it would be his last. How different it is now, to wonder if he's meant to be some sort of hostage or just an ally, and he wonders if he should be afraid, should muster up an emotion other than exhaustion.)

(Hakoda has a hard time drudging up any fear of anyone who takes good care of an albatross-pigeon.)

"Last I heard," he says, tone even, "the Dragon of the West was Fire Lord."

Azula scoffs.

"Some dragon," she says. "His plan only worked because my brother wears snake-skinks around his throat instead of cutting off their heads when they slither from the turtleduck pond."

Hakoda blinks at her and then gives Suki a questioning look.

Suki shrugs.

"Right," Hakoda says.

* * *

Zuko wanders over a little later.

"What are you doing awake?" he asks.

"I could ask you the same thing," Hakoda says, one eyebrow raised.

Zuko scowls, an old, familiar look, but then it slides off his face without any sort of shouting follow-up. It's disconcerting.

"Azula," he says, "do you need a break?"

"No," she says. "I'm not _weak_ like _you_."

The expression on the Fire Princess's face now—there's the scowling Hakoda is used to. There's the temper, the resistance to taking a spirits-damned break every now and then. 

"Well," Zuko says, calm and mild as a still sea, "if you have something more important you need to do, let me know, and I'll take over with the fuel."

Azula huffs and turns away from him.

Hakoda feels like he's having an out of body experience. He swears he's heard a version of this conversation somewhere before, this managing of an irate teenager. This is the Fire Nation pride he's used to. Typical.

* * *

"You made your uncle your regent?" Hakoda asks, sometime later, when they're alone.

"No," Zuko says.

He doesn't elaborate.

* * *

Watching Zuko and Azula interact with each other is like watching a reflection ripple in the water. They're the same distance apart in age as Sokka and Katara, and now and then they fall into a sibling dynamic Hakoda feels familiar with, recognizes as normal, but at least half of the time, Hakoda barely understands them. They seem to understand each other, at least; they've come to some sort of understanding, have worked something out. Every time he tries to predict what one will say or do in response to the other—as a strategist, he automatically thinks a step ahead—they do something completely different.

"Zuzu," Azula calls, and Zuko turns to her, a questioning look on his face.

That, for example—it's simple, a small thing, but Hakoda could never imagine Katara nicknaming Sokka like that, not at this age. 

More different is their personalities. He'd called the prince a badger-viper, once, but it's Azula who's more prickly. Zuko's mellowed out—he flows, Hakoda thinks. He flows like water with whatever comes at him.

* * *

How should Hakoda ask, Why did you help your sister try to kill the Avatar? Why did you put my children in danger again?

On their shift awake together, while Zuko adds fuel to the fire, still not explaining what's going on with his bending, Hakoda watches Zuko glance in the direction where all the girls are sleeping. It's a protective big brother look, is what it is.

Alright. So maybe Hakoda knows the answers to his questions. He supposes it's what Sokka would do, if Katara was the Avatar-killing type—follow his little sister anywhere.

Hakoda doesn't like it, since it wasn't the moral thing to do, world-saving-wise. But he understands it.

* * *

On another night when it's just the two of them awake, the girls taking their rest shift, Zuko works up the courage to ask what's been on his mind since the rescue.

"What happened to the others?" Zuko says. "You said they're alive, at another prison?"

Hakoda rubs the back of his neck.

"Some died in the invasion," he says, "the day of the eclipse. Some of them were taken prisoner with me before I was separated from them and sent to Boiling Rock. Some of them, I don't know what happened."

"Tell me," Zuko says.

Ranaluk went down. Hakoda saw it himself. Toklo, Panuk, and Bato were all captured. Kustaa and Aake either died or escaped—Hakoda lost track of them and didn't see them among the captured. There are names Zuko doesn't recognize—men from the ship that Zuko hadn't interacted with much, maybe, or maybe they're men from other ships in the Water Tribe fleet. Zuko listens to them all. These men, men he knows well, men he doesn't know at all, who were killed or captured by Zuko's countrymen.

"We were held one location before I was sent to Boiling Rock," Hakoda says. "And I heard the names of two other prisons before they separated me."

He gives Zuko the names when Zuko presses for more information.

"You think they're there?" Zuko says.

Hakoda nods. 

Iroh had been threatening the safety of the Fire Nation, with how easy he was making it for enemy nations to rise up against them while their guard was down. The Southern Water Tribe's forces being imprisoned is a good thing for the strong country Zuko envisions. But—but Zuko remembers what it was like, being locked up in that stone prison of his. And he knows, he _knows_ , that what happened to him isn't the same as where they are—not even the same as Boiling Rock, one of the strongholds—but he thinks, I can't leave them there.

"Fuck it," Zuko says.

"What?"

"Nothing," he says.

"You're still an awful liar, you know," Hakoda says, arching an eyebrow. It's not an unkind look, though. Something Zuko's better at deciphering from this man now.

"I know," Zuko says. "I'll explain when we trade shifts, when Azula and the others get up."

"Alright," Hakoda says. 

A bit of time passes in silence.

"What about Seal Jerky?" Zuko asks.

"I think he got away with the few ships that escaped," Hakoda says.

Zuko eyes him warily, wondering if this is one of those kinds of lies that his mother had tried once, the first of the two times that Azula had used one of the animals Zuko had liked for target practice. But Hakoda seems to believe it himself. Zuko thinks so, anyway.

"And the other albatross-pigeons?" Zuko asks.

"I don't know," Hakoda says. "What would Fire Nation soldiers do with a bunch of birds like that, when they capture ships?"

Zuko shrugs. He's not sure it would be anything pleasant.

"You know, Toklo was saying something, before we were separated," Hakoda said. "Something about—what was it—he liked to imagine the Fire Nation didn't know what to do with the birds, and that they'd all just flown away, back to the South Pole."

There's a hint of a smile on his face as he says it—at the idea, or at the memory of his crew holding onto hope, Zuko doesn't know which. But Zuko feels a similar fondness, a similar ache.

"Toklo would say something like that," Zuko says.

* * *

"Are you up for another prison break?" Zuko asks.

Mai, Ty Lee, Azula, and Suki all stare at him. Even Hakoda looks taken aback. 

Zuko can't help but turn red, wondering if it's seriously that bad of an idea.

"What?" Zuko says.

"What're you talking about?" Mai says.

Zuko explains himself, says who he's looking for, what he wants to do. 

"Two prison breaks, then," Suki says. "We have to free my warriors."

"Bold of you," Azula says, "to make demands of us."

Suki turns on her, looking ready to start yelling, but Zuko interrupts.

Because, this is also an awful idea, this is another betrayal of his nation, but—he can't say no that look on her face, that determined, hopeful look. Freedom.

"Fine," he says. "Do you know where they are?"

* * *

"What if we just free _everybody?_ " Zuko says. 

Azula can tell that Zuko probably doesn't mean to say it aloud. He's got his thinking face on. Dum-dum has to think real hard, when he has a thought in his head at all. It's quiet, when he does say it, but Azula hears him anyway.

"Building yourself an army, Zuzu?" she asks.

"What?" he says. "No."

He blinks at her, baffled, like the thought had never occurred to him, like it still doesn't make sense to him now.

Of course not. He spends too much time feeding rabbit-mice, keeps breadcrumbs in his pocket with no ulterior motive. He doesn't know he's training the panda-dogs as he does it. He'll bring them to bay on accident. A fool.

He's unaware enough that his hounds could bite him when he's not looking. And he's stupid enough to _let_ them when they do.

Stupid, stupid Zuzu. Azula had better keep her eyes on everybody's teeth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> bonus:
> 
>  **toklo, upon being broken out of prison:** your highness!  
>  **toklo:** *exuberant tackle hug, then just puts his arm around his shoulder*  
>  **zuko:** *flustered and just a touch shouty again but ultimately accepting*  
>  **toklo:** *notices azula, another fire nation royal child who is probably damaged and prickly*  
>  **toklo:** *advances with open arms*  
>  **azula:** absolutely not. 
> 
> I'll probably post a second part this weekend just because I didn't quite get to the hair-braiding scene that I wanted tbh


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Fire Lord's son gets his hair braided.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just a few additional vignettes. reiterating that big hawk is taken from / inspired by [this excellent series!](https://archiveofourown.org/series/1632730) please go read clockworkpunk's big hawk fics, my fic would not exist without them. love that big dumb bird 
> 
> i'm still trying to get a grasp on the group dynamic but i think this turned out okay?
> 
> for the record, I like the low ponytail that muffinlance gave zuko in towards the sun. i just needed sibling bonding time.  
> also, i had planned this chapter before muffinlance updated salvage with chapter eight. seems like we're all fascinated by zuko's hair! **and again reminder this crossover fic is not compliant with anything after salvage chapter seven or towards the sun chapter twenty!**  
>  one scene in here is inspired by one of clockworkpunk's comments on my last chapter, which you can [read here](https://archiveofourown.org/comments/281093839). (i like clockworkpunk's better, but i still got tempted to write a little snippet of my own in here)
> 
> anyway, enjoy?

Zuko has a bag with several Fire Nation scrolls in it. Unwinding one reveals a detailed map of the Fire Nation and its colonies.

"It'll take a few days to reach and plan for each prison," Zuko says.

"We'll have to be careful," Suki says. "Won't every other prison be on high alert, since we escaped?"

"Boiling Rock is supposed to be maximum security," Mai says, "and we gutted it like a fish."

"We conquered Ba Sing Se," Azula adds. "A prison is inconsequential."

"It'll be fun!" Ty Lee says.

* * *

The albatross-pigeon—Hakoda thinks the princess has been calling it Hawky, or something—rockets down in its descent. Azula steps away from the fire and Zuko slides over immediately to add fuel, the two of them synchronized, practiced. The synchronicity of it is the only thing keeping Hakoda from panicking when Azula shifts into a grounding stance. The bird bowls into her—or, it should; the albatross-pigeons had bowled the prince over many times back on the ship. Azula catches it in her arms but allows herself to move with the bird's momentum, slowly ending its plunge. Her back leg drops so she's on one knee, her body twisting. Then she rises fluidly, the huge bird still cradled in her arms.

She's like the prince, Hakoda thinks, but successful. Well, that's not right—Zuko caught the birds, back on the ship; he succeeded, but he got knocked over or lost his balance each time. So the princess is Zuko, but more graceful? No, Zuko has his own grace when he fights with his dao. 

Forethought—that's what it is. She and the prince could be the same, if only Zuko planned ahead. Azula is Zuko but more efficient.

"Good catch," Hakoda says.

Azula releases the bird and takes its caught fish from it.

"What do you do to them?" she says.

"I'm not sure what you mean," Hakoda says.

"You train them, right?" she says. "You take wild birds and make them the way that they are, to serve you,"

"I guess so," Hakoda says.

"So why," she huffs, "do you do this to them? What did you do to make her want to crash herself into the ground over and over?"

Hakoda thinks back to the ship, again—the prince, stepping directly into a landing bird's path, saying, Why don't you help them?

"That wasn't us," Hakoda says. "That's just its nature."

The princess scowls.

"Big Hawk is not naturally self-destructive," she says. "Something made her like this. And I will train her out of it."

"Good luck," Hakoda says, because he knows saying that their landing doesn't hurt them won't be believed. Zuko certainly hadn't stopped trying.

* * *

"Take over," Azula commands Hakoda.

Hakoda has to stop himself from saying, Ask nicely, as if she was a four year old asking for sea prunes before she'd finished her fish. He wordlessly retrieves some fuel and tends to the fire.

Azula walks toward where Ty Lee's sunbathing and Mai and Suki are sharpening their weapons.

"Prison ruined your hair," Azula says.

Ty Lee pats the top of her head, where a tightly-wound red ribbon holds her high ponytail in place.

"I don't think it's changed that much," she says.

"It's embarrassing," Azula says. "You can't be seen with me looking like that. Come here so I can fix it."

Hakoda frowns at the princess's rude remarks—precisely what one would expect from a spoiled palace brat, but Zuko had defied expectations (and normalcy, and rationality, and...), so this, now, doesn't seem right. Though, maybe it's not out of character; the princess has been sharp and prickly in even the short time Hakoda has known her.

Ty Lee blinks away her surprise and then walks over to Azula. The two sit on the floor; Ty Lee sits between Azula's legs, and Azula begins unspooling Ty Lee's hair, running her fingers through it. 

"You know, Azula," Ty Lee says, "you can do nice things without being insulting."

"Excuse me?" Azula says. "I am not doing something nice."

"I didn't know you could braid hair," Zuko says, heading off that argument before it gets wind under its wings.

Hakoda doesn't startle, but he certainly hadn't heard Zuko come up behind him. Kid moves like a ghost.

"Of course I can braid," Azula says, turning her irritation toward her brother. "What, like it's hard?"

And now it's Hakoda's turn to change the subject.

"Shouldn't you be asleep?" Hakoda says.

"It's hard for me to sleep during the day," Zuko says.

"Then why," Azula says, with the sound of someone whose patience is thinning, "did you take the night shift?"

Zuko shrugs.

Azula finishes braiding Ty Lee's hair. It still sprouts from her head in high pony-tail fashion, and it swishes when she rises. Ty Lee twirls where she stands, and Azula leans back to avoid getting hit in the face by the braid.

"Thanks!" Ty Lee says. "You should do Zuko next."

Everyone looks to Zuko, who bristles under so many eyes.

"What's wrong with my hair?"

"The low-ponytail isn't really you," Ty Lee says.

"It's hideous," Mai says.

"No, it's not," Suki says, putting her fans down. "I think it suits him."

"It's not what we're used to," Ty Lee says.

"So?"

"Zuzu can choose to look the fool if that's what he wants," Azula sneers, crossing her arms.

"Wish he wouldn't," Mai mutters.

"Everybody shut up!" Zuko says. "I'll get my hair braided. Jeez."

Hakoda breathes a sigh of relief at this. He hasn't been around this many bickering teenagers in a long time.

Zuko sits down in front of Azula, his back rigid and tense. Azula combs her fingers through Zuko's unbound hair a few times, and each time she runs her hand through it, Zuko relaxes a fraction. 

Hakoda notices that Azula doesn't give the same style of braid to her brother. She parts Zuko's hair into two sections instead of three, and the back and forth motion is very different from the intertwining that she'd done with Ty Lee. Zuko's dark hair separates and returns to itself, back and forth, as she works her way down the back of his head. 

"Fishtail," Ty Lee observes. "So pretty."

"Of course it is," Azula says.

Suki and Mai have gone back to sharpening their weapons by now, but Mai keeps an eye on the royal siblings, her brow furrowed and her gaze intent.

"Did Mom teach you to do this?" Zuko says, after a few moments.

The Fire Princess is the one who goes rigid, now. 

She lets go of Zuko's hair, rests her hands palm-up on her knees—on each side of Zuko—and then her hands _catch fire_ , bright and blue. Behind Azula, Mai and Ty Lee leap up, Mai's weapons at the ready and Ty Lee in an aggressive stance, and Suki turns to Hakoda, her eyes wide, clearly wondering if this is seriously going to be a fight.

Zuko is the only person still relaxed, still calm. He closes his eyes and breathes.

Big Hawk lets out a wild cry, drawing everyone's attention, and the bird beats its huge wings before settling next to Azula. It folds its wings back down and nudges her knee with its head, its beak dangerously close to the blue flames.

Azula closes her fists slowly, extinguishing the fire. She strokes Big Hawk's head a few times. 

"Zuzu," she says, her tone chiding, "now I have to start all over."

Mai and Ty Lee slowly relax from where they stand behind Azula. Mai settles back down next to Suki, who still looks unnerved.

Azula starts Zuko's braid over from the top of his head. Again—hair divided in two, moving the hair it back and forth, two halves weaving together.

Hakoda watches them, this brother and sister, familiar and yet strange. He tries not to think too much about when he'll next see his own children. Not soon enough.

He remembers his failed attempt at ransoming Zuko to his father, learning how little family meant to that particular brand of Fire Nation royalty, and he takes a moment to be grateful that, at the very least, Ozai didn't succeed in ruining these two. They still have each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry if the ending is corny and also sorry that we never actually make it to the prison break scenes, those were just... too intricate / complicated and i wanted to be finished with this ~~plot bunny~~ brain worm. 
> 
> none of the fire nation royalty ever wear braids in the show, but i feel like it's a skill azula knows. did she learn it from her mother? from a nervous servant? who knows! azula certainly isn't going to tell anyone.
> 
> the original draft of this had hakoda getting a third thin braid from azula next to the two beaded strands of hair he has but then zuko asked That Question and I couldn't think of a scenario where Hakoda would want to bare the back of his head and his neck to Azula like that afterward lol
> 
> also, if you like, [read this comment](https://archiveofourown.org/comments/283454857) on my last chapter!! toklo is such a gem


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